8/17 Not So Nostalgic Childhoods

 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "One of those kinds of nights."
 Awilix Zero says, "Yep. Canceled plans and silent streets. A real joy."
 Awilix kicks up her feet, leaning back on nothing but her own core strength.
(Awilix Zero)
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 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Pfffft."
 Gallagher would snort as he glanced over with his burning hazel eye, watching Awilix's frankly haunting display of core strength. The chair was compelled by its sheer gravity to remain in the place the Lieutenant desired, a clear display of the superiority of both her own physicality and the augmentations that had made her a more effective killer.

"Canceled plans? Never particularly pleasant. I've had my own share of disappointments admittedly. I've been busy with bureaucracy and paperwork for the Captain, and not really much of a chance to go out and explore...it's necessary work, the chain of command provides, but well..."

Hoss would flash a roguish smile to Awilix. A long drag was taken from his cigar, an emanation of mint and tobacco wafting from the frontiersman's form as he too attempted to lean back.


"I didn't get into soldiering for the paperwork."

Only to immediately fall, far too heavy. Who would have thought a gravity mage would be dense.

He'd just sit like a normal person.


"Close enough. Tell me about your childhood Lieutenant Zero if you desire, not an order of course, it's a quiet night."
(Gallagher J. Hoss)
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 "I don't remember my childhood. Thought I mentioned that, already."

From her leant position, there is merely a shrug. Whether or not she had before, she has now. Even the mention of such seems to reflexively uncork her always so conveniently prepared and full flask. It is still a mystery what she truly keeps within it, but there is a subtle, faintly visible rune of cold embed upon the otherwise perfectly smooth, metallic surface. Convenience, even if simple.

"It was spent under anesthesia, mostly. Y'know. I've told you."
(Awilix Zero)
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 Hoss would offer a brief frown at that; it is possible that she had told him and he'd forgotten, but something in the inner workings of his mechanical brain told him this was FRESH INFORMATION. Pausing briefly, he'd turn to Awilix with a blink.

"Forgive me if I forgot, you and I both have a habit of....what's the word? Tuning out?"

Hoss would make the face of staring blankly and disassociating.

Awilix hated pity; to bring it up in such a manner would only enrage them.

"...I grew up in a lot of stuffy classrooms, manors, and factories following my father around. The gears turned, he said, and we were the oil that greased them. I was to inherit his holdings as his father had before him, as his father had before him...a lot of old men with mustaches."

Hoss would click his teeth.

"...But I was flat footed, near sighted, partially deaf, had a spine with early scoliosis, and for all my wits, I was socially awkward. I clung to my father's hip like a ghoul."

Hoss would appear to....pop out his right eye; only to reveal that it was infact a wooden container. With a pop of the eye socket after a brief wipe down and cleansing bath of heat, a cup of emergency brandy was poured from the false eye's confines as the one eyed sniper chuckled.

"Emergency scotch. Almost as important as breakfast scotch, though not as important as dinner scotch."

Hoss would offer a smile.

"Consider this my reeducation. When do your memories really start to begin, become coherent? If you're not uncomfortable with it. There's sitting to do and ambient drinking to commit."
(Gallagher J. Hoss)
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 Tuning out. That was a polite way to put it, sure. But it was lost to her if she had ever really brought it up before- most people who ask about her past get some wishy-washy half answer reminiscent, but possibly not so clear as that.

She listens along, her ear offered with the occasional twitch off at something in the city, something unrelated to the two of them in the silent night hours of the city, casted alight somewhat by a dull bulb in need of replacement on the street corner, better by the small spiraling stones of crystalline mana that offer a more localized convenience with better an aesthetic.

"Probably around thirteen." She comments, letting the flask drop to rest at her side for a moment. "Around the same time as they had to stop replacing and upgrading parts of me when I stopped growing."

A sniff.

"Not to say they were very eventful. I was run through a lot of safety tests in my free time, and outside of that I was subject mostly to regimented military education. It was a program for youth. Sort of... a private, military school. But very small. I remember that much."

That last bit only really comes back to her as she speaks it into existence. An initiative, of sorts. But the details murk in her mind, cloud heavily under the years of fog.
(Awilix Zero)
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 Hoss would take a firm dredge from his cup as he made the whiskey face briefly, a loosening of his nerves following not long after as his flesh brain began to take precedence over his recharging machine brain.

Oft, they worked in perfect synthesis. But they did bicker at times.

"...I'd already been shot in the head around thirteen, hunting accident as you recall. Was actually...my first time hunting. Which saying that out loud; poses the question how I ever became a big game hunter with an initiation like that."

The lieutenant would chuckle as his face flushed lightly from the whiskey, turning his cracking hazel eye to Awilix's visage with an idle smile.

"But the surgery that saved me offered the chance for a wide variety of corrective operations. Left ear was blown off, but my mechanical hearing apparatus is immune to disorientation, and its feedback to my machine brain is instant. In a way, I can react by sound faster than sight."

Hoss would smile lightly.

"With a new spine offering a firm support for a young man who could suddenly hear, walk straight with kinetic soles, half a brain that worked a bit faster, more certain and confident than before, well....I realized my future was a prison."

Hoss would shake his head steadily.

"I snuck out with one of my father's rifles and hid in the sewers for a few weeks, hunting mutant industrial offshoots for game with my one, watery eye and scratching facial hair. And that's when I knew, the machine had a purpose for me."

Hoss would smile gently to Awilix.

"All that schooling explains your flawless discipline and candor, especially considering your suppressed temper. What happened after you graduated from black ops university?"
(Gallagher J. Hoss)
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She'd heard more or less his story now, but she still follows along with a fair portion of he riddle attention offered.

With little more than nods and sips at interval, he can go on freely, as she really- does not have much to actually contribute here. He might clearly remember his young life despite a bullet through the brain, but she, despite having no known issues with her brain whatsoever, isn't so clearly able to remember things.

"I went straight into deployment. Firstly, it was trolling the shitholes, low class areas. I remembered them well enough, even after everything." Because she grew up there, so of course she would. But she only really remembers that, again, as it spills out of her mouth between sips of the cure-all bottle.

"Yeah, I. Really excelled at crushing dissidents. Consecutive accolades saw me to 'promotions', moving basically out of the slums in my working range until I was training with maintenance companies and double timing live action in field work.

I don't remember how I survived on so little sleep, but it won me a lot of praise."

That's a lie. She does remember how she survived. She channeled all the monotonous suffering into rage on any out of line subordinate who breathed at her. Awilix was only so luck yo have cruel superiors who saw her a benefit rather than a hassle.

In honesty, it was at some points too easy- it felt like she could never mess up. It was so very different than being here, where everything feels slow. There is no urgency, no frantic pace to life.

It's not particularly enjoyable.

"Thus, my rank, and deployment here."
(Awilix Zero)
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 It appeared to mean much that Awilix offered an ear to Hoss at all; he'd spent a life as an eccentric scholar scaring people away with his rambling blabber. Very few truly listened, most had humored him because he had a nice mustache.

But she seemed to listen.

Pouring out the last of the gravitically compressed scotch that sat inside his eye flask, he'd place the wooden eye back inside his left socket with a wet pop.

And then he too listened, sipping and offering a steady, toothy smile with attentive nods at the more fascinating details.

"You were determined to fulfill your duties, and you did so to the best of your ability as any general could dream of in a model soldier. It's admirable, I've no doubt it wasn't ever....pleasant work, domestic affairs."

Hoss would take a HARD swig at that.

"Well, you know most of the rest of my story, but I omitted a few details. Before I chose to go on from my master's degree in zoology to officer's school, my father gave me...an ultimatum."

Hoss would frown lightly at that, taking a slow drag from his cigar before another swig of his scotch.

"He knew I didn't want to become an industrialist. He was willing to allow me freedom to continue my education with full funding for research, hunt to my hearts content, and never lift a finger; I needed only marry another wealthy family's daughter and live in in a lavish pleasure mansion."

Hoss would grimace.

"But if I left, I could not return. Not until the day he died. His son no longer."

Hoss would ash his cigar, the jolly removed from his visage as he finished his drink.

"I didn't look back. He wasn't angry. He never yelled, maintained a quiet and professional tone. But he sounded...disappointed, and sad. But there was no yielding for either of us, he'd taught me to live the same way he had."

Hoss would shake his head at that.

"All in the past now. What matters is we're here, Lieutenant Zero. This is the beginning of a new frontier for the empire, and our work will pave the way for civilization in these savage lands."

The smile would have return to Hoss' visage as his remaining eye fell on Awilix once more.

"I'm glad to serve beside someone as competent as you on this journey into an uncertain future; there is much about you to admire."
(Gallagher J. Hoss)
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 The pondering continues while Gallagher speaks, this time, so he retention does deviate as she wonders what work stimulants she was on back in the mainland, and if they could be produced locally or shipped domestically...?

Probably too much to hope for, that. It seems here in Esshar that they only dabble in mind-rotting meth and other such disgusting, unsavory excuses for self-enhancement with massive short and long-term drawbacks. It was only expected of Essharans, after all, to see one good thing and decide to never improve upon it.

"I'm sure." A flat and short reply comes, and she carefully begins the process of leaning her stool back onto two legs as she further extends, intent almost to stare up at the sky and pinch the mouth of her flask between teeth, emptying it down gullet with a few hefty swallows.

It was one of those nights where nothing mattered. Most of the soldiers were asleep or confined to quarters doing god only knows what. And here she was.

"I'm starting to think we need a fresh shipment of corporals to make up for the mounting casualties as more and more of our recruited and brought alike show themselves utterly incompetent in following order and responsibly undertaking their field work, though."

It was embarrassing.
(Awilix Zero)
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[03:45] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Pfffffft. "
[03:45] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Yes, I agree. I think there's much potential in the lot of course, but..."
[03:45] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "..."
[03:45] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "....."
[03:46] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "I've got nothing, some of them are somewhat braindead."
[03:46] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "But that just makes our job more important Awilix."
[03:47] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "We'll drill new gears for the machine bit by bit, that's what we're here for."
[03:47] Gallagher J. Hoss says, "I believe in our mission. And I'm certain we'll achieve it."
[03:48] Gallagher would raise a glass to Awilix in cheers, offering it to the woman to clank glasses if she gauged social cues. A toast.
(Gallagher J. Hoss)
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 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "If you clank the glass, I will stop bothering you."
 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Though it has been enjoyable drinking and talking with you. I'd like to do it more some time."
 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Suddenly it is counter-intuitive to clank the glass..."
 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "..."
 Gallagher would squint at the glass in his hand. Now it was a dangerous game.
(Gallagher J. Hoss)
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[03:53] Awilix slowly raises to tap one against the other. Very well.
(Awilix Zero)
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 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Now, I'm going to....disassociate. We may very well even disassociate next to each other."
 Gallagher J. Hoss says, "Go team."
 Gallagher would offer a last, warm smile to Awilix, giving her a one eyed wink before he tilted his hat down for a half snooze. Machine brain time.
(Gallagher J. Hoss)